Sidekicks.

I am trying, most likely in vain, to write about what happened this summer before the summer is really and truly over.  And here's what.  In just two weeks, Marley will be an honest-to-goodness first-grader and Rudy will soon be starting her second year of preschool.  Almost a week before that, my coaching career gets another go-round when field hockey preseason begins, and so it feels like I have mere days left of slow and sunny moments to waste on nonsense.

And so, here are some very important friends who helped to make Marley's and Rudy's summer super awesome: Carly and Paige, my friend Mary's daughters, both pint-sized and sassy, another dynamic duo of sisters who don't mind teaming up with Bean and Toot for adventure.

Before the summer had even begun, we went on our second all-girl camping trip the night the Celtics finally lost their conference series to the Heat.  Rudy had to stay behind because she was too sick, but Marley was game for strolls in nature, playground visits, and then later, a picnic-table dinner and some chocolate sneaked from the s'mores supplies before curling up in our shared tent for the night.  I was the one half-listening to WEEI by the campfire the rest of the night, partially panicked because the Celtics, who had hard-scrabbled for every post-season victory they could get were all too quickly sliding into a season-ending defeat, and partially delusional because it felt like since I couldn't see what was happening on television, that meant it wasn't really happening.  Right?

But they lost, and even so, the world continued to turn and the sun still rose the next day, as evidenced by a squinty group shot by Pawtuckaway Lake.  And then, I listened to sports radio all the way home.

About a month later, we met the girls in New Hampshire again, this time for our first family trip to Storyland, a amusement park designed for families with young kids.  So Todd and I spent a couple of happy afternoons zipping through the air on a roller coaster and plummeting down a log flume with our giddy and screaming daughters.  This was about a day after my mother's move into a nursing home was over, and the emphasis here on cheer and innocence and playing was sweet relief.

We spent one morning sort-of-climbing Mount Washington.  I think we hiked maybe a quarter of a mile, slow and steady along the wide trails, and it took at least a half-hour.  We took a break and perched beside a small waterfall for some photo shoots, handed out snacks, and then sauntered back down the trail to the parking lot.  Our daughters were clearly on Team Pink for the hike, and Paige, wanting to fit in with the glasses brigade, wore shades, which is appropriate because she's one of the coolest three-year-olds that I know.

And a month after that, we traveled north again for an all-girls sleepover when Mary's husband was out of town and Todd was busy helping friends with extensive home improvement projects.  There was pizza, there were brownie sundaes, and of course, there was dress up.  

And the next morning Carly and Paige pulled out their highly coveted Magna-Tiles for imaginative building which predictably turned territorial, as Marley wielded her authority as the eldest by forbidding anyone, especially her usual scapegoat Rudy, to dismantle what she had created.  Not the best demonstration of her meager experience, and certainly not my favorite version of it either, but I think she sometimes feels like the big big sister when we're with these sidekicks.  And the four of them, bossy sometimes-leader and temporary meltdowns aside, are a very cute, pipsqueaky team.